Jake > Jake's Quotes

“I kissed her cheek as she turned it to me. I think I would have gone through a great deal to kiss her cheek. But I felt the kiss was given to the coarse common boy as a piece of money might have been, and that it was worth nothing.”
― Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

“The story so far:
In the beginning the Universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.”
― Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

“Another thing that got forgotten was the fact that against all probability a sperm whale had suddenly been called into existence several miles above the surface of an alien planet.

And since this is not a naturally tenable position for a whale, this poor innocent creature had very little time to come to terms with its identity as a whale before it then had to come to terms with not being a whale any more.

This is a complete record of its thoughts from the moment it began its life till the moment it ended it.

Ah … ! What’s happening? it thought.

Er, excuse me, who am I?

Hello?

Why am I here? What’s my purpose in life?

What do I mean by who am I?

Calm down, get a grip now … oh! this is an interesting sensation, what is it? It’s a sort of … yawning, tingling sensation in my … my … well I suppose I’d better start finding names for things if I want to make any headway in what for the sake of what I shall call an argument I shall call the world, so let’s call it my stomach.

Good. Ooooh, it’s getting quite strong. And hey, what’s about this whistling roaring sound going past what I’m suddenly going to call my head? Perhaps I can call that … wind! Is that a good name? It’ll do … perhaps I can find a better name for it later when I’ve found out what it’s for. It must be something very important because there certainly seems to be a hell of a lot of it. Hey! What’s this thing? This … let’s call it a tail – yeah, tail. Hey! I can can really thrash it about pretty good can’t I? Wow! Wow! That feels great! Doesn’t seem to achieve very much but I’ll probably find out what it’s for later on. Now – have I built up any coherent picture of things yet?

No.

Never mind, hey, this is really exciting, so much to find out about, so much to look forward to, I’m quite dizzy with anticipation …

Or is it the wind?

There really is a lot of that now isn’t it?

And wow! Hey! What’s this thing suddenly coming towards me very fast? Very very fast. So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like … ow … ound … round … ground! That’s it! That’s a good name – ground!

I wonder if it will be friends with me?

And the rest, after a sudden wet thud, was silence.

Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again. Many people have speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that we would know a lot more about the nature of the universe than we do now.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“I went to the bathroom and threw some water on my face, combed my hair. If I could only comb that face, I thought, but I can't.”
― Charles Bukowski, Post Office

“Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be?”
― Danielle LaPorte

“She seemed a bit crazy but I kept looking at her body and I didn't care.”
― Charles Bukowski, Post Office

“And all the voices, all the goals, all the yearnings, all the sorrows, all the pleasures, all the good and evil, all of them together was the world. All of them together was the stream of events, the music of life.”
― Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha

“When you watch the news and see members of your species in turmoil, do not think there is nothing you can do. But know it is not done by watching news.”
― Matt Haig, The Humans

“Advice for a human

86. To like something is to insult it. Love it or hate it. Be passionate. As civilisation advances, so does indifference. It is a disease. Immunize yourself with art. And love.”
― Matt Haig, The Humans

“If getting drunk was how people forgot they were mortal, then hangovers were how they remembered.”
― Matt Haig, The Humans

“Let's not forget The Things They Do To Make Themselves Happy That Actually Make Them Miserable. This is an infinite list. It includes - shopping, watching TV, taking the better job, getting the bigger house, writing a semi-autobiographical novel, educating their young, making their skin look mildly less old and harboring a vague desire to believe there might be a meaning to it all.”
― Matt Haig, The Humans

“It's the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.”
― Oscar Wilde, Miscellaneous Aphorisms; The Soul of Man

“Punctuality is the thief of time”
― Oscar Wilde